News

TOI :
PUNE: Five months after the head of a corpse was cut off and stolen from the mortuary of Sassoon general hospital, the Pune crime branch on Saturday arrested one of the three suspects involved in the case. He has been identified as Shoaib Shaikh (20) of Samtanagar in Wanowrie and the police are on a look out for the other two involved.

Sustained interrogation of the accused revealed that the head of autorickshaw driver Natik Shaikh (25) of Nigdi was chopped after one Kumar Shirsat had challenged Shoaib and his associates to commit the act.

The corpse’s head went missing from the hospital on April 3 and was found in the waters of Mutha’s right bank canal at Hadapsar on April 7.

According to the assistant commissioner of police (crime) Sangramsingh Nishandar, Shoaib and the others had looted a scrap vendor in Pune cantonment before committing the heinous crime.

Shirsat, during a conversation at Wanowrie, challenged the trio to behead a dead body, which the suspects accepted. They first ate ‘pav bhaji’ at Sarasbaugh and later hired an autorikshaw upto the hospital. They entered the morgue from the back entrance and chose Shaikh’s body which was laying on a platform.

Nishandar said that one of the suspects, armed with a sharp weapon, cut the head and concealed it in a gunny bag. They then called Shirsat and showed him the chopped head, seeing this, a panicked Shirsat fled from the crime scene. “After the police launched a massive hunt to arrest the culprits, the trio threw the bag in the canal at Hadapsar,” said Nishandar.

The ACP said that their act came to light when a police informer overheard them talking about their feat over dinner at a restaurant. The informer alerted inspector Ram Jadhav of the anti-dacoity cell, crime branch. Acting on the tip-off a…More

TOI : PUNE: The Pune police on Saturday confirmed that the anti-terrorist Squad (ATS), Mumbai had recently detained four alleged members of the banned Students Islamic Movement of India from the city over their suspected involvement in various cases.

The suspects have been identified as Ayaz Yusuf Khan of Pune Cantonment, Irfan Khan and Illiyas Khan, both from Kondhwa and Nadeem.

Senior police officials say Ayaz was detained by the ATS, Pune in connection with a fake currency racket registered in crime register number 16/2008 with the Mumbai police. The ATS, Pune has also made an entry of Ayaz’s detention at the Cantonment police station. After an initial interrogation, Ayaz was handed over to the ATS, Mumbai on August 11 for further investigations.

Ayaz had earlier attempted to commit suicide by consuming pesticide in the city after he was interrogated and released by the Mumbai police. Ayaz’s family later alleged that the Mumbai police was planning to implicate him in the Ahmedabad serial blasts case.

As regards the three other suspects, the police officials claimed that the city police knew very little about their involvement as they had been picked up by the ATS, Mumbai. Additional commissioner of police (Crime) Rajendra Singh claimed ignorance about the details of the trio’s detention due to lack of co-ordination between the crime branch, Pune and ATS, Mumbai. Print EMail DiscussNew B…More

TOI :
PUNE: The city displayed its insatiable appetite for music as second round of the Independence rock (i-rock) contest made for a packed house in a city pub on Thursday. The evening saw the charged-up bands take centerstage as a crowd of more than three hundred hooted, cheered and screamed their lungs out in support of their favourite troupes.

The bands in focus were Pitch Black Symphony, Vyzasa, Wagon Rags and Secret Society who wooed the jury, enticed the crowd and kept the dance floor alive till late night. The headbangers fell in love with the progressive rock, and original tracks found their way into the hearts of the audiences.

As Sober, the lead guitarist for Pitch Black Symphony, one of the finalist bands, said, “The crowd is just awesome! We have played at the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta (IIM-C) and other big institutes, but this crowd is fabulous!”

Echoing his sentiment was Aman, the lead vocalist of Vyzasa. “We had a great time on the stage. We noticed that people want original tracks and we played a lot of them. They are very open to new and original music and our compositions in the progressive metal genre were received well.” Vyzasa was the other band that won over not just the audience, but the jury as well, to enter the final.

A testimony to the buzz created by the event was the presence of non-aficionados who ‘converted’ to rock music as the evening progressed. Sanjay Sohni, a software professional had come alone for the show “just to try out the music”. “I have not heard a lot of rock. I prefer lounge music, but the show is quite superb,” said Sanjay.

This reporter spotted an old lady, in her early 60s, having fun at the pub. As we tried to raise our voice above the already-high decibel…More

TOI : PUNE: State water resource minister Ajit Pawar said on Friday that the 20% water cut that was introduced in Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad has been withdrawn. This is following the water storage in most of the dams supplying water to the cities reaching the 96% mark.

Pawar also said the dams currently have sufficient water to cater to the drinking water needs of Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad till July 2009. The excess water would now also be made available for irrigation purposes.

“The 20% cut was introduced on July 16 following an extended period of dry spell in the catchment areas which left the dams with just 30% water. The cut was also extended for agricultural purposes and strict instructions were given for not releasing water for agricultural purposes till the dams had sufficient water,” Pawar said.

“The situation has improved considerably now with heavy rainfalls in the last 15 days. The water storage in four dams — Temghar, Warasgoan, Panshet and Khadakwasla — has reached 96.39% of the total capacity of 27 TMC. Pawana and Mulshi dams too are filled to the optimum capacity. The water cut has been withdrawn considering this,” he said.

Pawar pointed out the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) is using more water than its approved quota. Around 11.50 TMC of water has been approved for PMC for the entire year. However, over 16.40 TMC water is being used by the PMC at present. Print EMail DiscussNew B…More

TOI : MUMBAI: Attacked by the MNS activists on Friday, the Mercedes Benz International School in Hinjewadi, Pune, will face action from the state education department for not following its directive about celebrating Independence Day.

Education minister Vasant Purke told TOI that he would initiate action against the school. “We had made it clear that all schools in the state will have to celebrate Independence Day with the students. I will be soon telling my officers to start action.”

The school’s head, M Thomson, has a different story to tell. “We were ready for the flag hoisting at 7.50 am, but the MNS activists came in and did not allow us to hoist the flag. They did the flag hoisting themselves.”

Eleven members of MNS were arrested on Friday and produced before judicial magistrate first class, Umeshchandra More, who remanded them to magisterial custody and later released them on bail.

Hinjewadi police senior inspector D.A. Shinde and inspector Bajirao Mohite said that a handful of staff members celebrated Independence Day, but none of the students were present as they had gone to their hometown for a brief vacation.

MNS members had barged into the school and pelted stones demanding that the school should foist the Tricolour with the students. They repeatedly asked why the students were not present for the celebrations. Print EMail DiscussNew B…More